Clinging to my gods and my guns while I chronicle the demise of western civilization from my bunker deep in the woods of northern Canada.

Wednesday, 28 January 2015

Reading Obituaries

Opening today's newspaper I saw Angelo's obituary. I felt like I had been
punched in the stomach. He passed this week from cancer. I hadn't even known he
was sick.

Death may be every bit as much a part of life as birth but we mourn the
former and celebrate the later and no amount of self deception allows us to find
any joy in the death of those we care about.

Angelo would be in his 80s, I guess. The obit didn't say. He was an Italian
from the old country who worked on the track crew at the company I worked for.
Sometimes he was a laborer and worked for my father. Angelo and Dad became
friends as soon as they met when they both came here in the early 70's. Angelo
with his broken English and Dad with his deep Maine accent, it was a wonder they
ever understood each other.

Every year Angelo made wine and every year when it as ready he and Dad would
get tanked together. Angelo's wine was peasant wine, high octane.

Angelo retired twenty years or so ago and about the only time I ever saw him
was in the super market or the doctor's office. He always greeted me with a huge
smile, a big hug, and a "How's Dad?" Asking about my father. Late in life I had
taken to calling him Dad when I would see him. A previous illness had taken
Angelo's voice away. He spoke in whispers the last of his life.

If you saw Angelo you saw his wife. They were always together. Theirs was an
odd story. Fern had been married to Angelo's brother and bore his son. After his
brother died Fern and Angelo got married and Angelo adopted the boy, Romeo. Fern
and Angelo were deeply in love and in what must have been difficult
circumstances at the time.

A couple of years back Romeo dropped dead with a sudden heart attack. I saw
Angelo in the market a few days later. I had no idea what to say. He hadn't seen
me. I stood for a moment and then walked up to him, took his arm, and said, "I'm
sorry, Dad." He turned around and hugged me tight and began to cry. Then his
wife saw us, joined the hug and she cried too. I didn't know Romeo that well but
because they cried I did too. The three of us in the middle of the
supermarket.

I didn't know he was sick. I didn't know he had cancer. I realized the other
day that I hadn't seen him in a while. I found myself thinking I should stop by
his house, say hello. The last time I had seen him he looked old and frail. I
thought I should also see if he needed anything done. Around the house, you
know?

But then I didn't. And today, the obit in the newspaper. I felt like I had
been hit in the stomach.